A SCHOOLGIRL had 12 inches of her hair cut off to help raise funds to send an ill toddler overseas to receive potentially life-saving treatment.

Eight-year-old Janey Archer, a pupil at Hexham’s Sele First School, got her long locks chopped to donate to the Little Princess Trust, raising close to £500 for Ella’s Hope charity through sponsorship in the process.

The charity was set up by Gemma Edwards, the mother of three-year-old Ella Hunter, who suffers up to 40 seizures a day, to raise £40,000 to send the Hexham Priory School pupil for pioneering treatment at the Stem Cell Institute, based in Panama.

With thanks to the hair cut, the updated total raised by the charity is close to £8,000.

In addition to the fund-raising event, a stall run by Janet Newton at Prudhoe Town Fair raised more than £250.

Up next in the fund-raising drive for Ella’s Hope is a family fun day at Tynedale Cricket Club, in Hexham, on June 23, and a family event at Prudhoe Sure Start on July 31.